Truth Social, Donald Trump’s Twitter-like social media platform has launched on the App Store, CNET has reported. That confirms a statement from a verified account tied to Truth Social chief product officer “Billy B,” who told people to mark February 21st on their calendars.
“We’re currently set for release in the Apple App Store for Monday, February 21st,” he said, according to Reuters. Incidentally, the 21st marks the Presidents’ Day holiday in the US.
Provided the network doesn’t suffer a hiccup like the one it did last fall when a prankster claimed the “donaldjtrump” username and posted an image of defecting pig, the launch will mark Trump’s return to social media. Twitter and Facebook banned the former president following the January 6th attack on the US Capitol.
Before a test version of Truth Social was pulled down last fall, the website’s code showed it ran on a mostly unmodified version of open-source software Mastodon. In October, the Software Freedom Conservancy accused The Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG) of violating Mastodon’s AGPLv3 license by not sharing the platform’s source code. The website added a dedicated section containing a ZIP archive of its source code two weeks later.
Based on the posts seen by Reuters, Truth Social won’t stray too far from the Twitter formula. People can use the network to post “Truths,” the platform’s equivalent to tweets, and it’s possible to reshare posts on one’s timeline to expand their reach. The executive who answered questions from beta users said the company was working on a verification policy that it would publish “in the coming weeks.” He also mentioned TMTG was also working on a direct messaging feature that would come later.
Update 2/21/2022 2:28 AM ET: Truth Social has indeed appeared in the iOS App Store, though some users are reportedly having trouble creating accounts, according to CNET. Some are receiving an error message when they try to enter a birthdate, email or phone number, while others say they were placed on a waitlist. The article has been updated with the latest information.
